Clip My Wings And Lay Me To Sleep
by la Belle Luna Claire
Summary: Ezabela is a bird girl without a flock. She's all alone in the world, thinking that she's the only one, bouncing from place to place and telling her story the whole way.
1. Freak

**A/N: So this is my first attempt at a Maximum Ride fanfic. I'm not sure how well it will go, but I really like the series and I just **_**had**_** to write it. Be sure to tell me what you think. This is just the little introduction. The real story will get started... well, when I get the chance to write it. I won't say when that is, because I'm the queen of killing deadlines, even the ones I make for myself. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride...**

Freak

Have you ever met a kid that you thought was so sweet and so loving and so kind and so wonderful and then found out that there was something wrong with them, like they had been beaten by their father or their mother was a drunk or they were sick with cancer or some other really sad, really depressing thing? If you didn't know any better, I could be any one of those things. But I wasn't, not really. I was just a freak. A five-foot-five-and-an-half-inch tall, thirteen-year-old freak. If it wasn't my height that made me freakish, it was my hair and eyes; the brightest white-blond hair and _huge_ chocolatebrown eyes. And I do mean _huge_. They took up most of my face, like someone had painted two quarters to look like human eyes and glued them in the place where normal sized eyes should be. Oh yeah, and if _that_ wasn't weird enough, you could always look at my upbringing and physical attributes.

You might want to sit down for this, because anyone standing might come crashing to the ground with shock.

My name is Ezabela. You can laugh. I know it's weird, but I like it. In fact, I picked it out. Yep, you heard me right; I named myself. I was five years old and living in a cozy little dog crate.

Ah, see? You're not laughing anymore, are you? Yeah, I had a feeling that would spike your interest. Just picture a little five-year-old girl with blond hair and brown bug eyes living in a dog crate. You know, the ones made out of black bars for overactive Chihuahuas and poodles. Now picture that little girl with bird wings sticking out of her back.

And that's where people that are standing up have now fallen over. I'll give you a minute to compose yourself.

...

Alright, your minute's up. If you'd rather go read something else, say, something _without_ a weird little bird girl locked up in a dog crate, then go ahead and leave. I promise that I won't hold it against you, but if you want to know the truth, then I suggest that you plant it right now and get settled for a long story, because boy is one coming...

**I know it's short, but this was just a short intro to Ezabela as a character. I'll write more as soon as I get the chance. Please review! If you review, I'll post sooner... maybe...**


	2. Home For Unwanted Runaways

**A/N: Here's chapter two. I think that I'll have one or two more "intro" type chapters before I start making the plot known. I was a little sad that no one really read my story, but I changed the description of it, so maybe some people will read it now that the second chapter is up. And I did make this chapter longer, in case you care... Anyway, enjoy!**

Home For Unwanted Runaways

Whether we like it or not, the kids of Gloria's Home For Runaway Girls are up at six-thirty in the morning. It's part of the rules here; if you're not up when breakfast is served then you don't get any. Unless you're sick, which I've been told happens every now and again to humans. I wouldn't know. I wasn't human enough to get the common cold apparently.

Of course, I was always up before the other girls, getting dressed in the large bathrooms that were set up like in a gym, with stalls for the toilets and others for the showers. I was among the group of girls that took showers in the evening, when I could, with some degree of control, choose a time when there were no or very few people in the bathroom. Lucky for me that most of the girls had the decency to _not_ barge in on another girl's shower.

Anyway, I was always the first up so that I could get dressed alone. I could only imagine what the other girls would think if any of them ever saw my wings.

Yeah, I was serious about that, in case you were a little suspicious. When they were fully extended, they were probably about eleven or twelve feet from tip to tip. But I never extended them fully. In fact, most of the time, I had them bound tightly against my back with bandages, so tight that I could barely feel them there, in the little valleys of my back where they would fold up neatly after flying. But I didn't fly. That was a sure fire way to get seen by the Erasers and then they would either (a) kill me on the spot or (b) take me back to the School, and we're not talking a crappy public middle school here. We're talking about an ultra secret, ultra high-tech, ultra messed-up-in-every-way-humanly-possible lab, filled with mad scientist and their – mostly – failed genetic experiments. I had managed to escape with the help of Jessica, a lab tech turned good guy. I was only six years old when she had taken me away from the School. When I was eight, I left, knowing the danger that I was putting her in every day that I stayed with her. I haven't seen her since.

So anyway, the School is full of genetic failures. In fact, all of the experiments seemed to have failed except for me and the Erasers.

Oh, right. You're probably thinking, _Eraser? Like the little pink thing on the end of a pencil?_ Uh, no. Erasers are part human part wolf or dog or something like that. Human/lupine hybrids. They're big and mean and they love the taste of disobedient experiments, especially the ones that have flown the coop. No pun intended.

I'm what's called a human/avian hybrid, about 98% human and 2% bird. Creepy, I know, especially when you mix in my physical appearance. I wasn't joking about the eyes earlier, either. They're really are big as I said. Like, Allison Harvard of America's Next Top Model big. And if you're wonder how a little bird kid like me knows about a CW show, they why don't _you_ try to live in a house full of girls from the ages of six to nineteen with one TV and a system of "majority wins". Ding ding ding! Yep! You get ANTM, Gossip Girl, The Suit Life of Zach and Cody, Hannah Montana, American Idol, and any other really preppy show you can think of.

Yeah, living with a group of nothing but runaway girls is probably equivalent to a sorority house of crack, if you can picture that. At least most of the girls are really nice, though. It would suck if they weren't. Luckily, Gloria, the founder of the Home, is really strict about certain rules like that. Thank god for grownups.

So, like always, I was up and in the bathroom by six o'clock, my hairbrush, toothbrush, toothpaste and clothes in hand. I dressed first, like always, so that I could make sure that my wings were carefully bound away where no one could see them and them I brushed my teeth and my gnarly hair. That probably took the longest in the morning, which is the reason I used for getting up so early in the morning; my hair was insane when I first woke up.

By the time I had finished, the first people started trickling into the bathroom. There were about twenty of us girls at the Home. I would name them, but I don't think you want me listing a bunch of girls' names. Some of the first to enter the room were the three sisters, sixteen-year-old Hope, twelve-year-old Faith, and seven-year-old Grace. Their parents had died in a tragic car accident and they ran away in order to stay together. Gloria took them in and gave them a place to stay. Still, Hope acted the part of "Mom" for her two little sisters. I wished that someone would look after me like Hope looked after Grace and Faith. Next came in Falissity and Olivia, talking animatedly. Lissy and Livvy, the two best friends of the Home. They were both fifteen-year-old runaways that had met when they first started out on their "epic journey" a year ago, which led them here. Others started to come in with varying degrees of life on their faces. Most of us were not morning people.

A couple of people said "hello" to me, but most just got in line to get dressed, brush teeth, take showers and go to the bathroom. I left quickly, trying to make more room in the crowded bathroom.

I was, naturally, the first person in the dining room. Gloria was there, smiling as always, behind the long counter where a mountain of eggs, sausage, and toast were piled up cafeteria-style. I grabbed a plate, tray, and silverware, pushing it along the metal bars, taking as much food as I could without making Gloria suspicious.

"Good morning, Ezabela," Gloria said kindly, smiling at me as I took a couple pieces of sausage.

I smiled back at her. "Good morning, ma'am." I was always very polite to adults. They were older and wiser that I was and they were people that kids could count on. The only ones that weren't like that were the scientists back at the School. I almost shivered as I remembered being poked, prodded, shocked, and run into the ground. And the needles that they put in my arm. I hated needles. I have what is known as trypanophobia, or extreme fear of needles.

I moved quickly through the empty line and sat down in my usual spot. It took only a couple minutes before other girls started coming in the dining room, chattering away with friends. A couple girls, like Daily and Jessica had wet hair from their abnormally quick showers, which had me wondering exactly how clean they can get in two minutes. Within ten minutes, all the girls were either sitting down or in line.

"Hey, Ezi," a friendly, sweet voice said.

I looked up from my plate. Violet and Katty slid into the spots right in front of me and right next to me. I smiled at them. "Hi Kat. Hi Vi."

All three of us talked through breakfast. Our chatter was pointless, really. I was just really happy that I actually had friends here. Katty and Violet were both thirteen, the same age that I was. At times, I really loved them, and at times, I envied their sweet, girlish innocence, something that I could never have. I don't know, I guess that something about growing up in a dog crate with crazy doctors doing painful tests can really take an innocent little girl and turn her into a mature adult trapped in a child's body. I knew that I could never truly fit in with normal human children, not even if someone clipped my wings off.

**I'll get the next chapter up when I finish writing it. Be sure to tell me what you think of my writing, characters, plot, or anything you want. Suggestions are always appreciated. Please review! It will make me very happy!**


End file.
